1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a high pressure steamer for continuous wet-heat treatment of a long cloth by subjecting the cloth to such treatments as desizing, scouring, dyeing, felting and weight reduction in a high pressure steamer.
2. Description of the Prior Art
In subjecting a long cloth produced commercially to such treatments as desizing, scouring, dyeing, felting and weight reduction under wet-heat (hereinafter simply called wet-heat treatment), a Perble Range (commercial name) and a high pressure steamer, both being developed by the present inventors, have widely been adopted. The outline of the use of Perble Range for the wet-heat treatment of a cloth is to soak a cloth to be treated with a treating solution, and to treat the resultant cloth in a reaction tower for steaming the cloth under the ordinary pressure. The use of a high pressure steamer is to soak a cloth with a treating solution, and to subject the resultant cloth to steaming in the high pressure steamer body. Generally speaking, the use of a high pressure steamer is desirable. The treatment is done at a high temperature under pressure, so that the reaction proceeds speedily, and the treatment is suitable for mass-production. The quality of the product is also superior in many instances.
However, in subjecting a cloth to such treatments as desizing, scouring, bleaching, dyeing, weight reduction by using a high pressure steamer conventionally applied, it is usual to apply a treating solution (such as a caustic alkali solution in pretreatment and weight reduction and a dye solution in dyeing) to a cloth to be treated in a liquid tank provided outside the steamer body or in a liquid seal tank provided at the inlet side seal mechanism of the steamer body, and to subject the cloth thus soaked with a treating solution to steaming in the steamer body. Thus, the application of a treating solution to the cloth is done only one time, so that the amount of the treating solution applied to the cloth is frequently insufficient according to the kind of the cloth and an excellent wet-heat treatment can not be done.
For instance, in fixing a dye printed on a cloth with a prescribed pattern in a high pressure steamer, the interior of the steamer body becomes frequently in a dry heat state due to the deficiency of water vapor, and it requires a long time (for instance 2 to 3 minutes) until the fixing of the dye is completed, preventing a high speed and excellent dyeing. Further, while an increasing amount of multi-fiber cloths has been produced in recent years to meet with the demand of high class cloth, it is necessary thereby that the atmosphere is in a sufficient wet-heat condition, and a satisfactory treatment cannot be expected in the conventional wet-heat treating method.
Under such circumstances, the present inventors have recently proposed a high pressure steamer for continuous wet-heat treatment of a cloth, for which apparatus providing a plurality of boiling tanks (liquid applying tanks) in the steamer body for subjecting a cloth passing through the steamer body to boiling and steaming alternately and repeatedly. However, in this apparatus, since water at the ordinary temperature is supplied successively from outside of the steamer body as a means for supplying water to each of the boiling tanks provided in the steamer body, a large quantity of water is necessitated, and further, a large amount of steam is condensed in the steamer body for the reason that the water supplied from outside of the steamer body is at low temperature, thus decreasing the temperature in the steamer body and consuming heat energy. The apparatus proposed was not yet satisfactory.